The year I was a Freshman

I had promised several weeks ago that I would post a reflection of college. College got really busy the last couple of weeks and now I'm finished. I've walked across the stage, received my diploma holder, and then took my last finals (all 5 of them! wow.).

So here it goes. Today I give you freshman year.

The Chicago River

So I was off to Chicago. After a summer of good-byes and high expectations of the windy city I was finally there. In my little dorm room with a student athlete, there I was. My parents took me to Target to get some little things before they left and I broke down. I didn’t realize the loneliness I was going to feel the moment they left. They had literally been there for everything in my life. I thought I was ready to live hours away from home, on my own. After the initial shock of being on my own I eventually made some friends, my roommate was great, our suitemates were great. School was much more difficult than I imagined, but I survived. I came home for fall break and this is when I decided I couldn’t make Chicago my home, simply because it wasn’t my home. During this semester away, my suitemate and I would go to a great church in a great neighborhood in Chicago. We tried to get involved in student ministries, I just never felt like I met a group of people who I could connect with. I often regret that I didn’t stay longer, but then I look at the Wells Fargo student loan statement that they send me every year and decide it was probably a good idea to not go to a private school all four years of college. After this semester I realize God totally sent me to Chicago for his purpose. The amount I learned from him in these 14 weeks was incredible. He taught me what full trusting in him looked like. One day, being so broke and feeling like I couldn’t ask mom and dad for any more money, I happened to win a contest that I didn’t know I entered and won 100 dollars. This was just enough to get me through the rest of the semester, buying Christmas presents for my family too.  Even though I was making friends, I was so depressed at Loyola. I remember crying through my biology class one day, because I just wanted to be home.  At this point in my walk I wasn’t journaling, so I really can’t remember what I was saying to God, but I imagine it was like “Lord, PLEASE help me get through these next weeks without dying.” I was a dramatic little freshman. I managed to make it and return home for my next semester.

Some Friends

Sweet Puppy Violet

Returning home was so hard. I didn’t think it would be, but my close friends were gone. I was living with my parents, so it made it difficult to make friends. I almost regretted coming home and going to KSU. I thought KSU, being a state school, was going to be easy. No, it was actually much more difficult than I imagined. In February of my freshman year I learned some shocking news about my family and again I spent most of this semester crying out to God. I asked for healing, restoration, strengthening and all of that He gave and He gave fully. My faith shook due to a certain biology class that I was taking. My professor made fun of Christians daily. All of this craziness and difficulty had taken a toll and I had no idea what to do with myself. So I secluded myself, drowning myself in TV shows. Eventually one night, one of my friends invited me to a campus ministry that I had never heard of. There I saw another friend who invited me to a Freshman lifegroup. I was TERRIFIED to go. I was so shy and all these kids from Johnson County were freaking me out. But I went and I made myself keep going. It was here that I met Ms. Mary Beth Gromer, who would later be my roommate. This was also the time that we got Violet. Our sweet little Mini Schnauzer who loves to be loved. It’s crazy how full my heart feels when she cuddles with me. I’m a nut-case. 

Acadia National Park

So in the middle of the spring semester I found an opportunity on Facebook to go to Maine for the summer through Campus Crusade. I said to myself, “Anyway to get away from this madhouse and take a walk in one of the most beautiful places in America? I’m there.” So after talking to my parents and fundraising, I got on a plane to Bangor, Maine. It was gorgeous. The people that I met there, the vulnerability that we shared, the thoughts that I refused to encounter at home, made this experience incredibly unique. God taught me true forgiveness, which is something that I had never learned. God taught me that I am my own person and that sometimes it is okay to say No. God also taught me that I need to listen, that my relationship with him was quite one-sided at the time and that HE was also apart of the relationship too. These valuable lessons I took home with me, and my walk and relationship with the Lord was dramatically changed. I found a journal from that trip. I didn’t write much, I was still figuring that one out… I’m still figuring that one out. After reading through it I’m amazed at how I’ve grown, how my bouts of disbelief are no longer what they used to be. “It’s very humbling to stand in God’s creation… so then why is it so hard to listen and feel guided?” My simple thoughts have now become more complex than that. I see my trust in him as grown tremendously since then. My heart for him has grown tremendously since then. Just now I am seeing fruit.

My job wasn't too busy, so played
silly computer games mostly.

As the summer rolled on I knew that I could no longer be living on my parent’s money, I mean I was already living in their home. So I searched for a job. ALL summer long I searched for a job. At the beginning of August I was called in for an interview at Pawnee Mental Health Services.  Starting this job was difficult for me. It called me to be loving to those who were so different than me. Not only did the job call me to do that, but God called me to do that. Oh, what I learned from this job. I’ll try to share. I learned how to not be afraid of speaking to people on the phone. I learned that love has no bounds. I learned of the demons that people face and live with daily. I learned that sometimes all we need to do is look a person in the eye. It also taught me to be tough and have a little backbone, how easy it is to get manipulated. I could name so many more. This job touched me beyond what I ever thought it could. It was difficult to have people spill their hearts out to me over the phone because they felt no one else would listen. It was difficult for me to see the HELP line go off and realize that someone is legitimately thinking of ending their life in that moment. It was difficult for me to see the violence that people suffered and were willing to dispense if threatened. I worked here for two and a half years and my heart softened and hardened at an incredible rate. This job had a flexible work schedule, but it meant that I had to work Monday through Thursday evenings. This means that I almost always missed Ichthus and was unable to join many student activities. 

There will be more I promise. I know... I left you all with a huge cliff hanger! haha.